The 2011 National Open is now
underway at the South Point Hotel, Casino, and Spa in scorching Las Vegas.
After two rounds a single word can be used to describe the tournament so far:
eventful!

Our newest GM, Sam Shankland

The schedule was slightly
different from last year, as both the G/10 and blitz side events were held on
Thursday, a day before the tournament. Several GMs participated in both events
and an important lesson learned from playing and observing these events goes as
follows:

Whether you are an amateur,
expert, or grandmaster, if you have 10 seconds left on your clock and your
opponent has 12 you better just throw any pieces you can grab and hope for the
best.
U.S. Game/10 Championship

3-5thplace went to GM Tamaz Gelashvili, GM
Giorgi Kacheishvili, and GM Aleksandr Lenderman, each with 5 points. The U2300
prize went to Ernesto Malazarte, who earned 4.5 points, and the U2100 prize was
split by Tony Yim and John Iinuma.
Blitz

GM Lenderman

The Blitz event was about twice as
audacious as the game/10, since playing without any delay caused players to
lose their minds in the furious haze of time-scrambles. Towards the end of the
1st game of Akobian-Lenderman, literally everyone in the room
(including those still playing) stopped and stared as the two well-respected
GMs pushed as many pieces as possible and frantically slamed their side of the
clock as a new chess rule was born: When all the pieces on the board are
knocked over and the clock shows 0:00 for both sides, a draw shall certainly be
agreed!

GM Loek Van Wely took first place
with a superb score of 10.5/12, beating GM Henley 2-0 in the last round. GM
Aleksandr Lenderman took second with 10/12 after going on to win the second
game of his match with GM Akobian, and GM Giorgi Kachieshvili took third place
with 9.5/12, beating IM Altounian 2-0 in the final round. The U2400 prize went
to Deniz Seyhanoglu and Erich Siebenhaar, with second going to Arun Sharma.

Main Event

While the first round of the 3-day
section could be considered a warm-up round, with the only significant upset
being GM Lenderman giving up a draw to FM Michael Feinstein of Texas, the
second round was of a bloodbath nature similar to round 2 of the recently
concluded Chicago Open. The top seed of the tournament, GM Loek Van Wely (who
warmed up in Round 1 by swiftly trouncing yours truly), was upset by IM
Andranik Matikozyan, who played a very interesting game:

GM Giorgi Kacheishvili also went
down to another tough player, IM Dionisio Aldama, when he lost (sacrificed!?) a
piece in a tragically complicated King's Indian middlegame.

GM Kacheishvili vs. IM Aldama

Among these two major upsets there
were also several draws, and after the smoke cleared the leaders with two points
are GM Tamaz Gelashvili, GM Varuzhan Akobian, GM Suat Atalik, IM Matikozyan, IM
Aldama, and several other strong players.

So far the event has been
organized and run very well, and easily one of my favorite things about this
event is how many people come to just spectate.
Dozens of people anxiously watched the end of the aforementioned Matikozyan-Van Wely game as well as Rensch-Akobian,
which ended with a nice queen sacrifice:

Round 3 continues Saturday at 10
AM, with the 2-day section merging in at the beginning of the 4th
round. Visit www.vegaschessfestival.com for results, pairings, live games and
more information about the tournament and continue to check CLO for the final
recap of this wonderful event.